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Solfadore ranks all 127 Ace Attorney Characters
In honour of Kanz and Omega's playthrough of the AA series, I decided I might as well rank the series' best and worst characters, since case rankings are done all the time and since it's been a long time since we've had a comprehensive ranking of AA characters. I don't think my taste in characters is way out there, so there shouldn't be a lot of surprises as we get near the top, but then again, there might be two or three controversial rankings. As a rule of thumb, I tend to like well-executed and fascinating villains more than I like heroes, so expect to see a few of these alongside the top. That said, a lot of Ace Attorney's good guys are really, really well-done, while a good bunch of villains (save for the few great ones) tend to fall flat on their face. Please note that this ranking will only include characters featured in games up to and including Ace Attorney Investigations. Since I haven't played AAI2 or Dual Destinies yet, I will not bother ranking characters featured in these games. One pther thing: I'll be cheating a bit with my rankings and will consider PW1-PW3 Phoenix as one character, and AJ Hobonix as another. Why do I do this? Because contrary to even, say, Ema Skye, Nick's character in PW1-3 and AJ is so radically different that I almost feel like they designed the 'Hobo character' first, and then decided to name him Phoenix Wright due to executive pressures. So yeah, in order not to be unfair to Shu Takumi's protagonist, I'll divide up the entries. Tier Eleven: The Dreaded Turnabout Yes, I made a tier just for a single character. I'm sorry, but I just hate that person too much. Please note that that person is ranked lower than all the victims. Make of that what you will. 127. Wendy Oldbag Cases: 1-3 (Witness), 2-4 (Witness), E-3 (Witness), E-5 (Witness) Let me get things straight: Oldbag was fine in 1-3. The dev team was obviously aiming for an annoying first witness who let her anti-Powers/pro-Hammer bias get the better of her common sense; that’s par for the course as far as PW witnesses go. The awful, awful thing about her character is how they just keep recycling it in nearly every single game. She was a huuuge pain in the ass in 2-4, since on top of being her usual annoying, uncooperative self, she also happened to be the toughest witness in the game, IMO – and for bad reasons, with really unclear contradictions and the like. The rest of the case is amazing, but she just brings it down. Oldbag has NO business being in a final case. You’d figure since she hates Phoenix, she’d be a lot more fun around Edgeworth or something (especially since she has that huge crush on him), and lo and behold: here comes AAI, in which she's just as bad as usual, and where she not only appears once, but twice! First in the terrible E-3 case, where she brings nothing of value, and then – since apparently they haven’t learn their lesson from 2-4 – in yet another final case… and in the showdown against the Big Bad, too. Even if they have some sort of Oldbag quota to fill, couldn't they at least have her be the first witness and get out or something? Save for Edgeworth in 2-4 and 3-5 as a whole, I feel like the AA series hasn’t handled cameos well at all, and Oldbag is most definitely the worst offender. Can’t we get back, like, Morgan, who’s actually interesting and could be delved upon a bit more? Or, hell, the whole cast? I hate Oldbag. Tier Ten: Turnabout Victims Get ready for a bit of boredom, but we'll have to trudge through this sooner or later anyway, so might as well get this done with and get to the good, meaty characters (or the ones we love to hate). 126. Ka-Shi Nou Case: E-5 (Victim) Thoroughly uninteresting guy whom we still know nothing about even after finishing the case. The double-murder setup in both embassies was cool, but where Coachen was an interesting victim, that guy definitely is not. It’s just such an anticlimax to go back to this murder after the whole Shih-Na/Yew stuff. 125. Dustin Prince Case: 2-1 (Victim) Nothing interesting about the case, nothing interesting about its victims. He’s a… policeman. Woohoo. Next. 124. Buddy Faith Case: E-1 (Victim), E-3 (Side Character) Well, what can you expect from a guy murdered just because he walked in on the killer committing another crime? Nearly as bland as Prince, but at least he did something before dying, as opposed to just being… there. 123. Cindy Stone Case: 1-1 (Victim) The first victim! Yay! Just as bland as the others, but apparently, she did genuinely love Larry. From the top of my head, she’s probably the only character in the series to actually love the guy. That has to count for something. 122. Ini Miney Case: 2-2 (Posthumous Character) This is the one that died in the car crash. The twist alone would normally be enough to at least move her up a few spots up the list, but I find Mimi’s façade to be incredibly annoying, and since Mimi… mimicked her sister’s personality, I guess Ini’s to blame for this. At least she had the good sense to die in a car crash, which is more than I can say for Oldbag (if it ever comes to that, I’m rooting for the car). 121. Cece Yew Case: E-4 (Posthumous Character) I have nothing. Can’t even recall if we knew anything about her aside from the fact that she was an important witness/defected from the smuggling ring. If it is the case, that has to be enough to put her above these other jokers. 120. Ami Fey Cases: Various (Posthumous Character) She has to be the least relevant character in the entire franchise. Well, I have nothing negative to say about her, at least, and I think it was stated somewhere that her lingering spirit might be why that urn keeps breaking again and again. Which means she’s responsible for that cute as hell Maya/Mia picture at the end of T&T. 119. Bat Case: 2-3 (Quasi-Posthumous Character) A blustering idiot, but his name is so hilariously bad that he ranks above Ami and her cohorts. 118. Akbey Hicks Case: E-2 (Victim) That guy looks like Kristoph. I remember being really pumped up for AAI, thinking Edgeworth’d meet a younger Kristoph, but alas, it was not to be. Plus the whole Interpol shtick is a pretty cool deal, though I expected him to put up a better fight than this. 117. Glen Elg Case: 3-3 (Victim) Hey! Look! Another terrible name! 116. Doug Swallow Case: 3-1 (Victim) That guy was one of the few that was on to Dahlia. Plus he acted like a bro by warning Phoenix about the spawn from hell that is Dollie. Sadly for him, he’s not compelling at all beyond this. 115. Kane Bullard Case: 3-2 (Victim) Dude was an *******, but as far as victims go, that’s a point in their favour. At least they have some character. Sadly, we barely even learn about Bullard aside from the fact that he blackmailed Atmey, and since we only ever learn of his existence after the first day of trial, well… he wasn’t going to rank very high. 114. Mack Rell Case: E-4 (Victim) These awful names…! I don’t like that guy’s design for some reason. It just… stands out, I don’t know. That said, Rell was Yew’s accomplice, which makes him a bit less bland – and a lack of blandness is good in these rankings! Not much more to say beyond that, sadly. 113. Romein Letouse Case: 4-3 (Victim) Awful name streak currently set at 2. Letouse was chill and had a cool gun on one hand, but had that streak of terrible flashbacks on the other. 113 sounds about right. S-Siren. 112. Bruce Goodman Case: 1-5 (Victim) He was a… good man. Stood up to Gant and everything. That takes some balls. 111. Pal Meraktis Case: 4-2 (Victim) Pal Meraktis. Mal Peraktis. Malpractice. Hah. Bad pun aside, that dude is almost the real villain of 4-2, and that ‘killer nearly acted in self-defence’ is pretty much the only good thing 4-2 has going for it. That, and he almost ran over the terrible train wreck that is Hobonix. 110. Deid Mann Case: E-4 (Posthumous Character) This right here. That *has* to be the single best name in AA history. 109. Neil Marshall Case: 1-5 (Posthumous Character) Neil looked alright and did manage to overpower a serial killer. Aside from that, not much to note about the guy. 108. Celeste Inpax Case: 2-4 (Posthumous Character) When you first see her appear in your Court Record, she’s shrouded in an aura of mystery. Her name as well reinforces the idea that she might be really, really important to the case. Turns out she ain’t. 107. Russell Berry Case: 2-3 (Victim) That guy was an idiot. “Oh, Acro may be planning to hurt my daughter in X days? Let’s not do anything for now and go meet him at that exact time/date, instead of, say, GO TALK TO HIM RIGHT AWAY.” Awful case aside, though, he seemed kind – and they had to pull the “wrong target” twist sooner or later. 106. Byrne Faraday Case: E-4 (Victim) I cannot for the life of me remember anything about the guy except that he was Kay’s father and one third of the Yatagarasu. That, and I don’t like his design that much (like Mack Rell, it just seems weird). Tier Nine: Turnabout Vaguely Interesting Victims and Other Non-Entities Nothing much to distinguish this tier from the last one, but I feel like these victims are slightly more interesting than the last batch. 104(T). Missile Aww. Missile is adorable. Not much to say about the guy, since he really is little more than an... item... as far as character importance goes, but he's adorably useless and makes for a more compelling character than a lot of the riff-raff we've seen thus far. 104(T). Shoe Let's be frank here: Shoe is a top-tier character and a fantastic villain. Great reveal, great breakdown, a ***** to cross-examine - all-around awesome. Problem is: if I rank him higher, I kinda spoil the whole "Shoe is the secret mastermind behind 2-4" shtick, and that just won't fly. Newbies to the series could get spoiled. And, well... Shoe would want it this way. Shoe's okay with 84. Because Shoe knows deep down that, in the end, he'll be Number One. Long story short, I've always liked the "Shoe is evil" meme, though it wouldn't feel right to rank the cat any higher when the reason for its awesomeness doesn't derive from the game itself. Just like Zak is a jerk, but we'll get back to that later. 103. The Blue Badger The wriggling piece of plywood is actually really funny in 1-5, eliciting great reactions from everybody involved. I might be alone in this, but its presence in 1-5's 2nd trial day and its unexpected resurgence in Ema's account of SL-9 is one of the very rare instances of mood whiplash/comic relief I've tolerated in high-tension, high-drama final cases. 102. Gregory Edgeworth That Atticus Finch expy really did sound like an all-around inspiring/awesome guy, and he raised a damn fine son… that said, getting shot by Von Karma can only get you so far. 101. Turner Grey Hey, look! Someone who’s actually alive! And human! And not Oldbag! Grey’s way too fidgety for my tastes, and let’s face it, he was kind of an *******. BUT we did get to talk to him, at least. Glad he died, though. 100. Oliver Deacon/Colin Devorae As much as I hate E-3, Deacon was a pretty good victim. Looks like the bad guy at first (even if everyone who has played 3-2 knows the kidnapping is probably staged, meaning the culprit has to be Lance), but he did stand out for his daughter in the end. 99. Manny Coachen Coachen had potential – shame we didn’t get to interact with him a bit more. I like his sleazy/creepy design, plus he made for an interesting E-5 victim (as opposed to the bland pile of boredom that is Ka-Shi Nou). 98. Valerie Hawthorne What I like about her: - Has the ability to make you go “Oh ****” when you first see her name and realize that this case will herald Dollie’s return as the first recurring villain in the series. From her name alone. That’s pretty cool. - She’s actually pretty rounded for a victim. A greedy douche at first who staged her sister’s death so they could make off with the diamond… but then feels guilty and tries to turn things around. I like that. 97. Jack Hammer The fact that he was 1-3’s real villain is a very nice twist (because let’s face it, Dee only acted in self-defence and is almost blameless in all this, manslaughter aside, although she did blackmail him). That said, I have no idea how his plan of murdering Dee would have ever actually worked. “Ha! I have now just drugged Powers, leaving him without an alibi! The plan is perfect!” And you, Einstein? Where’s your alibi? And why the hell would Powers ever murder Dee? 96. Bruto Cadaverini Dude looked cool as hell – a damn shame we didn’t get to meet him. Still, he gets some props for utterly terrifying Tigre, although his position as head of the mob does help a lot. Tier Eight: Turnabout Interesting Victims and Terrible Characters Just to make things clear: the victims in this are all good characters and definitely in the victims' top tier. The actual characters, however, are either bland or terrible. 95. Wocky Kitaki Let’s face it, Wocky is utterly terrible. In a game filled with awful defendants, Mr. Haircut here just has to be the worst of them all. Stupid, non-cooperative, annoying gimmick – all-around terrible. I think the main problem here is that he wants to get convicted, yet lacks a real reason for it. Lana wanted a conviction to protect Ema (no doubt she saw that as a liberation as well). The fact that she constantly kept pushing for a guilty verdict, yet still held out to that one, mad hope of seeing the real murderer, explains why she didn’t fire Phoenix outright when he turned out to be way more competent than anticipated. Wrighto himself in 3-1 didn’t want Dollie convicted, but still wanted to avoid a guilty verdict as well. That’s cool. Ron Delite in 3-2 has a damn good reason to gun for a guilty verdict. But Wocky? Just because he’s dying anyway, he absolutely wants to go down as a murderer. Because it’s cool. Screw that guy, seriously. There are many problems with 4-2, but I’d say the second-biggest one is its defendant. As for the worst flaw in 4-2… 94. Wesley Stickler …that’d be panties politics, as embodied by Mr. Stickler right here. Just looking at him makes me think of horrible 4-2 Day One memories. He has a terrible gimmick; his testimony is nothing refreshing for the series, and well… the case really *is* that uninteresting, at least until late Day 2 where it gets slightly more bearable. He had potential, too, if you take away the panties and just have him be the usual obnoxious witness who never thinks they’re in the wrong and then surprisingly turn out to be correct in the end… but no, they had to raise the panties question again. I hate that guy. 93. Mike Meekins I think I hate that guy even more, but at least his character is objectively a bit better. He was fine in 1-5 (although by far its worst character), but of all the potential AA cameos, Meekins is the one they bring back for AJ? Seriously? Like (a) certain other character(s), Meekins reappears way too often for his own good. He’s incredibly shallow and just feels like a badly-done Gumshoe. Plus, his megaphone is really grating on the ears. 92. Director Hotti/Director Hickfield Yawn. Next. (Am I the only one who finds his crush on Trucy disturbing?) 91. Penny Nichols Yup. They could seriously take this character away from 1-3 entirely and not a single thing would be changed, just like… 90. Lisa Basil Why does she even exist? At least she has that amusing SPARDA line. Great job from the localization team! But yeah, just like Penny, I fail to see the point of her character. IMO, a character in a mystery should either be there because they’re the murderer, an accomplice, a witness or a red herring. Penny and Lisa are neither – they’re just empty space. 89. The Bellboy Aww, who doesn’t love the Bellboy? I like how he keeps coming back for random cameos, too! (See, THIS is how you make a funny, non-intrusive cameo!) Everything about him is so… I don’t know, ambiguous, for lack of a better term? Either way, he’s weirdly likeable… but being the Bellboy can only get you so far. 88. Magnifi Gramarye The Supreme Jerk, second only to Zak himself. No, seriously, think about it: how could Valant ever have a shot (hehe) at winning the rights to Magnifi’s magic? If Zak goes first and shoots the clown, Zak gets it. If he shoots Magnifi himself, Valant gets nothing either. Dude only called Valant at the scene so he could be a fall guy when Magnifi inevitably suicides/gets killed by one of the two magicians. Magnifi Gramarye is a terrible person. No wonder he chose Zak. I think a way to round this character a bit better would be to have him secretly believe that Valant was the one who shot Thalassa. Hell, maybe that’s what he thinks and this is why he’s such a **** towards the guy, but the writing team sure as hell didn’t spell it out or even hint it! 87. Robert Hammond Okay, see, this guy was an ******* as well, but he at least raises compelling questions. Save for maybe one or two exceptions, we never really see an “evil” defence attorney, and the few we do see aren’t really evil in their attorneying. Kristoph, for instance, may have forged a piece to get back at Phoenix, but given his paranoia over that one bit of forgery, I doubt he did it regularly, if at all, or else he’d have clocked *quite a few* more people along the way. Hammond, on the other hand, is a character that this series sorely lacks otherwise: a slimy defence attorney who’s ready to do anything just for a Not Guilty verdict. A guy like this would make for a fantastic antagonist in AAI/AAI2/etc., and would introduce compelling moral issues as well. So yeah, Hammond ranks as high more for what he represents than what he is, per se. 86. Joe Darke Darke’s cool. I like how his face is framed in shadows – and how he’s simply just crazy. The man’s been dead for years, and yet you still feel uneasy whenever they bring him up. Nice change of pace, for once. And yes, he does rank higher than the likes of Penny because he’s a more interesting character, even though you only learn about him from second-hand accounts. 85. Redd White Admittedly, it was a tough call between White and Wellington for the ‘worst culprit’ position, but in the end, I feel Redd hurts his case more badly than the other guy does (mainly because the other guy's case is already terrible), so he edges out a win. The problem with White is that they built him up too much and gave him way too important a role for the kind of… threat he projects. He’s described as this incredibly threatening, uber-powerful blackmailer who controls everything and everyone… and then you meet him, and he just comes off as a pretentious cretin. That, plus he has a terrible breakdown – “Oh no, a dead person allegedly summoned via spirit channeling mumbo jumbo is about to provide the list of names everybody knows I’m blackmailing anyway. I CONFESS EVERYTHING”. He’s like the anti-King Madagascar in Pandemic II, where the slightest hint of a potential damaging information is enough to send him into a confessing frenzy. Plus, the fact that you know straight away that he’s your guy takes a lot of the fun away. Sure, AA is often more about the howdunnit than the whodunnit, but it’s still fun as hell to suspect X or Y character and see your suspicions validated when they decide to stop playing games and start getting serious – would 2-4 be as great as it is if Engarde had been drinking bourbon/coloured grape juice right from the start? 84. Richard Wellington Yeah, that guy sucks. Not sure why I have him higher than Redd White or the others, but oh well. Why would clunking Phoenix on the head do anything? How can one expect the other to develop amnesia? How would that even help? WHY WOULD YOU EVEN TESTIFY, YOU TWO-FACED IDIOT? THEY GOT NOTHING ON YOU OTHERWISE! He’s like Frank Sahwit, but less endearing. 83. April May The problem I have with April is less with her and more with the terrible case she appears in. She’s alright in it, although her seduction gimmick gets old pretty fast – and contrary to, say, Dahlia, I have a hard time seeing the court buy it (not that any real-life court would ever buy into Dahlia’s shenanigans, but Dollie’s antics are at least believable in the PW universe). Here, though, it’s too upfront to allow for reasonable suspension of believability – and that hurts her character quite badly, since that’s pretty much all she has. 82. Cody Hackins I get what they were trying to do with this character (have a child witness that’d lie for a very ‘childish’ reason), and it does make for an interesting combo w/ Oldbag, allowing the series to spread its wings with two unreliable witnesses who don’t actually have anything to do with the murder. That said, Cody is an annoying brat, and unlike Oldbag (1-3 Oldbag, that is. After that, she’s just a pain), there’s no particular fun in sticking it to the kid. It does make sense to have a child witness in a case like 1-3, though, and I fail to see a case where it’d be more relevant. It had to be done; luckily the two/three other child characters in the series are far, far more likeable and interesting. 81. Sal Manella His 1337-speak got annoying really quickly, but I like that he’s pretty much AA’s first decoy villain (though you stop suspecting him to be the culprit as *soon* as you see Dee). Yeah, I don’t really have any more to say about him. He’s not terribly interesting and back in 1-3, the series was still defining itself. 80. Juan Corrida Don’t be fooled by the low ranking: Juan is probably the most interesting victim, barring characters that had a chance to interact with Phoenix/Apollo at one point or another before punching out. I like how both he and Matt were jerks of epic proportions, and his whole “I’m dumping Celeste because Matt used to date her” shtick is both terribly saddening and strangely funny. As evil as Matt is, you never really feel bad for Juan. Guy had it coming. Tier Seven: The Lame Turnabout For characters that could've been good, but just turned out lame as hell. 79. Larry Butz Don’t get me wrong: he’s a pretty good character per se. He’s just re-used WAYYYYYY too often. Way too often. - He’s the perfect 1-1 defendant. Incompetent, yet strangely sympathetic (perhaps because of said incompetence), well-meaning, kind if a bit naïve. The character is well-developed from the get-go. - His presence in 1-4 is welcome as the one sure-fire ally you have sans Maya and maybe Gumshoe. Plus he bails you out in the trial, which makes for a good sidekick/underdog story. But then he comes back in 3-2, just as useless as ever. And he’s somewhat important to the case. At least you don’t have to cross-examine him again, right? Sure. But then 3-5 comes around, and Larry is the one, single bad thing about an otherwise perfect case. Every other character is great and had to be there. Even Bikini’s a great witness! But this guy? Just some bad, bad comic relief that falls on its head and never wants to leave – which detracts like hell from the drama surrounding 3-5. I don’t get the need to bring in comic relief that late into the game. We’ve already been through 3-4, guys! There’s no longer any space for comedy – we’re just here to finally put the past behind us, bring Dahlia to justice once and for all and resolve all those unfinished mysteries and questions that mired the trilogy (such as the Misty Fey enigma). We don’t need Larry. I hate his E-5 shtick even more, where he comes back for absolutely no sound reason. At least with 3-5, you could somewhat understand the… idea behind him being there – since they’re bringing back almost every relevant character, might as well have this guy in there as well, no? I tend to disagree, but the reasoning is at least understandable. Here, it’s just stupid. “To bring back the Steel Samurai?” Why would they need to bring back the Steel Samurai in a diplomatic context? It’s dumb. I hate this guy almost as much as I hate Oldbag now, even though he was pretty solid in AA1. So yeah, Larry gets ranked this low not for who he is (despite his annoying tendencies, he's still a fairly likeable and well-established character), but for what he represents: the writing team's tendency to always bring back unneeded characters for endless cameos. 78. Lauren Paups Don’t like her, don’t like her personality. I like, however, that she was an accomplice in the kidnapping scheme. Don’t like that she’s doing it out of misplaced love for a douche like Lance. I just don’t buy that relationship (Lance is obviously a jerk, so I’m fine with him pretending, but she obviously doesn’t love him – or shouldn’t, given how she reacts to Edgey – yet still acts like she does. 77. Maggey Byrde I’m a bit divided on this cameo. On the one hand, I do still feel like it was done a bit too much; on the other, it’s not really intrusive. Maggey’s first appearance in 2-1 is brief, since 2-1 is after all a short case; 3-3 gives us great moments with Gumshoe, and she doesn’t detract too much from E-1. However, I do find her character to be a bit… lacking. The whole “I’m so unlucky, yet remain hopeful that things will turn out okay in the end” trope has been done countless times and has never been particularly interesting. Plus, how is she less lucky than, say, Maya, who got framed three goddamn times and survived two assassinations/kidnappings, in addition to losing her mother and sister? I fail to relate to Maggey here. The one thing she brings to the table is a delightful relationship with Gumshoe, but here’s the thing: that’s all on Gumshoe. Gumshoe’s the adorable one here; Gumshoe’s the one you root for. Maggey just sits there. You could literally replace Maggey with Random Character #1043 and keep Gumshoe the same, and the relationship would be just as sweet, meaning I can’t credit her for it. 76. Regina Berry Lame character in a terrible case, and since she’s the most to blame for how 2-3 turned out (along with Acro), she’s the first to go. Why’s she higher than the others we’ve seen so far, though? Well, she’s still somewhat interesting – what with the sugary view of the world she has and her astounding naiveté. See, the problem I have with 2-3 is not that its characters are bad, but that they never click together. At all. They’re just there, all of ‘em living their lives apart from one another, and you never feel tension between them. There’s tension between Oldbag and Powers, between Marshall/Starr and Gant, Morgan and Maya, Engarde and Andrews. Nothing of the like in 2-3. I blame it on the lack of a good strong character to pull everything together in a cohesive way. Usually, it’s the murderer, but given that pretty much everyone in the Berry Big Circus has a huge crush on Regina, it could very well have been her as well – and she dropped the ball big time. Thus, as a standalone, she’s quite acceptable, the problem being the fact that the rest of the cast and her just don’t click together. 75. Ben & Trilo Quist On the matter of characters that just don’t click together… Not much to say about that one that I haven’t said in the Regina write-up. I guess that he’s (they?) there mainly to serve as a decoy culprit, and though I feel like the ventriloquist gimmick could’ve been really interesting, these guys just… don’t pull through. I’m mostly going to blame this on Ben being such an extreme doormat. Instead of making him all shy and fidgety and weak, they should have made him really kind. The contrast it’d have made with Trilo would’ve been really surprising, yet also interesting and eerie. The way it is, though, I just feel like Ben/Trilo is wasted potential. 74. Machi Tobaye Another day, another terrible AJ defendant! That game really does have the worst defendants in the series, and it’s not even remotely close. Same as Wocky, this guy almost seems to want to get that guilty verdict at first, although that at least is justified in the circumstances, since he barely speaks English and probably figured that being a child, he’d get life behind bars or something, instead of the automatic death penalty that is Borginia cocoon smuggling. Even then, the character doesn’t quite click – for quite obvious reasons. I don’t know whose idea it was to have a character who doesn’t speak English – or at least isn’t supposed to – as a defendant, but they clearly didn’t think things through. We’re supposed to pull for this guy, remember? If you don’t want him to speak, at least give him hand gestures or something, I don’t know. His design is quite bad as well: the sunglasses, the lack of visible emotions, etc. It makes him really non-relatable, which is rather bad for a defendant. At least the whole thing clicks at the end, so you can kind of forgive him for being so uncooperative, but it’s still annoying. On paper, this character makes sense, but in practice, he’s just too distant to rank any higher. 73. Lance Amano Uuuuuugh I hate E-3 for no rational reason. I dislike every single one of its one-shot characters. I find the whole setup to be uninspiring. Some of the blame should therefore properly lay on Lance Amano’s shoulders, who comes as little more than a slightly smarter Richard Wellington (not a good sign for criminals, and especially bad the later into the game we are!). The minute he comes in and turns out alright, you just know he’s behind all this, but since he’s just not compelling at all, you never really care about exposing him. He’s just a selfish brat whom I can’t even get to hate. I just dislike him a lot. Maybe because of his design (ugly fat rich kid has seldom been a compelling selling point). Maybe because the actual plot of the case is a tad lazy and predictable. Either way, out of all the characters in the case, he should’ve been the one to carry it (or at least the case’s ‘main plot’ that is; instead, Lang and Kay have to carry the whole thing by themselves – which they thankfully did as best they could, but it’s still not enough to redeem this boring case in my eyes, and for that, I’ll blame Fatty here. 72. Winfred 'Big Wins' Kitaki A+ design (that apron + Vito Corleone combo is just too good). Lacklustre animations. Not enough screen time. The result? A lot of wasted potential, all of it amounting to a quite mediocre character. Big Wins, I feel, could’ve been used much more efficiently as a red herring – the fact that he’s so impassive as well could’ve fooled players into thinking it’s all a façade. Sadly, the dev team just decided to have him hang there in the background being vaguely – but so vaguely – threatening. Take the ‘wonderful’ panties shenanigans and stuff them in a box somewhere, and instead, give more screentime to the Kitaki family, and you’ve got a recipe for a pretty solid case. Alas, it was not to be, and as is, Big Wins deserves nothing more than the 72nd place. 71. Jean Armstrong Looking at my list, I think we’re about to near a turning point; that is, I kinda like all the characters left, at least to some degree (barring one or two exceptions), even though the one or two elements I like in them may be grossly overshadowed by a massive heap of flaws. Armstrong’s a good example of that. I like his ‘role’ in the case. At first, he seems like he’s simply the usual terrible/pointless 3rd case witness that everybody hates – and his design sure screams that… And yet, you start to figure out after a while that the Pink Chef is a lot more involved in the actual crime than one might’ve thought at first glance. Plus, his motivations (blackmail, which ensued because his oils are understandably not selling well at all) actually make a lot of sense. His stand in court is also surprisingly pleasant from such a flamboyant character – you’d expect a pile of awkwardness, but it’s actually quite serious and, while easy, provides a nice opportunity to think through the Court record and what one knows of the case. On the flipside, his gimmick is terrible and he’s just so unpleasant to be around with that one can’t really *like* the character that much. Also, the kleptomania thing was really unnecessary. 70. Angel Starr Out of all the “serious” 1-5 characters (that is, out of all the 1-5 characters not named Mike Meekins), Angel Starr is by far my least favourite, which is just as well since you only see her for one day and then she’s pretty much gone. That being said, she’s pretty much the reason why Day 1 – Investigation AND Trial – sucks so much. I find her gimmick to be terribly uninteresting and kinda tacked on her character just for the sake of giving her a gimmick. What she *does* have on her side is a good dynamic with Lana – she makes a good first witness in that she did witness the somewhat-murder-but-not-really, but on the other hand can’t be trusted because of how much she despises Lana. That alone should have been enough to propel her to at least the top 60 or so – especially when she essentially turns out to have been correct with respect to what she saw – but on the other hand, her cross-examination is so awful and hard for all the wrong reasons that I really can’t do anything than rank her this low. 69. Victor Kudo Heh. Dude’s an alright “first” witness and did lead to the cleverest contradiction in the game (stain on the wrong side of the cup, which took me way too long to spot, but was totally fair game). And while he has that ‘annoying old man’ vibe, it’s never played to the extreme – he’s fairly rounded out in a way Oldbag absolutely isn’t: just a lonely, bitter old man who has a hard time finding a place in today’s society. In the end, you almost feel bad for poor Victor Kudo. Still won’t prevent me from ranking him this low. 68. Ernest Amano Oh wow, I have him this high? Guess I liked his kind demeanour and the fact that he was actually kinda smart to boot, even though he turned up to be somewhat of an *******. All in all, him turning up to be evil was still pretty much a surprise (though I really shouldn’t have been surprised, given his design), and I liked that he tried to ingratiate himself to Edgeworth, instead of bullying him around like most of the early AAI villains do. Speaking of early AAI villains…